Andy Kaufman And 6 Others Who May Not Have Died

Earlier this week, a woman walked onto the stage at the 9th annual Andy Kaufman Awards and dropped every single jaw in the room by announcing a) she is Andy Kaufman’s daughter and b) the legendary comedian is still alive and kicking. Within hours, news of the utterly bizarre appearance was widely circulated on the Internet. Not long after that, video even emerged, as well as rumors about the alleged daughter’s real identity.

I’m pretty confident the entire stunt was one elaborate hoax. More than that, I’m extremely confident Kaufman himself would have loved it. His life was a long series of wacky shenanigans, many of which were designed merely to screw with people’s heads. His first appearance on Saturday Night Live is a great example, as is his legendary fight with Jerry Lawler on Letterman. Because of that crazed spirit and the strange circumstances surrounding his death, we’re probably in for a Kaufman-related conspiracy every half decade or so for the rest of our lives.

He’s not the only dead celebrity who people have been convinced was very much alive, though. History is filled with plenty of examples of people who won’t go peacefully into the grave. Thanks to this latest bout of Kaufman whispers, now seems like as good of a time as ever to explore some of these crazy rumors. Here are seven famous faces who some think may not have died when we initially suspected.

Tupac Shakur

Tupac Shakur was shot in a drive-by on Las Vegas Boulevard following a heavyweight boxing match between Mike Tyson and Bruce Seldon on September 13, 1996. Hundreds, maybe even thousands, of witnesses heard the gunshots and saw a still unidentified white Cadillac speed away. The rapper was hit several times amidst the haze of bullets, and seven days later, he died at the hospital. The case is officially unsolved, but Pulitzer Prize winning journalist Chuck Philips pointed to problems between Compton gangs as the motive behind his murder in what many consider to be the foremost analysis on the subject.

So, why the hell do people think he’s still alive? Well, Tupac recorded a wealth of material prior to his death. Most of it was unreleased and has since slowly hit the market in various forms. His manager, Suge Knight, who was in the car at the time and was grazed by a bullet, has made several comments over the years that seem to imply Tupac is still alive, and there have been several pictures/ videos that emerged after his death showing the rapper wearing shoes that weren’t released until later. Beyond that, there’s a bunch of complicated nonsense about number patterns and Pac changing his name to Makaveli not long before the supposed murder.

Ruling: Tupac is almost certainly dead, but at least he has a hologram.